Now that the Google Chromebooks, the personal protective equipment and other special items have been secured with federal funds, California’s K-12 schools stand to gain another $16 billion. It’s coming from the $1.9 trillion coronavirus stimulus bill that President Joe Biden signed in March.
Just 18 percent of those surveyed by the University of Southern California and the California Emerging Technology Fund said they would prefer to return to the office full time if allowed.
Officials became aware of a “large-scale security breach of electronic financial records at Huntington Park City Hall” that was “intercepted and contained” by the city’s IT department, and the Huntington Park Police Department initiated a criminal investigation.
Dell Technologies said the spinoff means it will be able to strengthen its market position and expand in growth areas including hybrid cloud, edge, 5G, telecom and data management.
The satellites’ targets will include oil and gas operations, waste management facilities, dairies and other industries that researchers say spew much of the state’s methane, a short-lived but powerful pollutant that is more than 80 times more effective at trapping heat than carbon dioxide.
The governor said early in the coronavirus pandemic that he planned to make telework a permanent option for state employees, and he ordered department directors in November to incorporate savings from remote work in proposals for mandatory across-the-board spending reductions of 5 percent.
The details, released Tuesday, mark the first time the Mountain View-based search giant has outlined specific efforts it will undertake for the community, after months of closed-door negotiations with the city. The City Council is expected to decide on the development agreement by June.
The Accellion system was attacked over the winter by suspects exploiting a flaw in its software. Among the other colleges reportedly affected are the universities of Maryland, Colorado and Miami, and Yeshiva University in New York. Government agencies and private companies were also targeted.
The auditor’s report urged the California Department of Public Health to conduct a thorough re-evaluation of its contact tracing program by May 15. In its written response to the audit, the department said it’s already retooling the system.
The new software program is an all-in-one system, which means each of the department’s three divisions can work more efficiently. The upgrade includes a streamlined report-writing module, portals for the courts and other county offices to view information, and an evidence system component, according to the Sheriff’s Office.
The California State Controller’s Office has notified more than 9,000 people with unclaimed property whose information could have been improperly accessed by a hacker, and is taking additional security measures following the breach last week.
The new training aid is part of the department’s $1.48 million, five-year contract with Axon Enterprises Inc., which supplies the agency with Taser stun guns and body-worn cameras, as well as related software and cloud video storage.
The worker went “directly into the server” and copied patients’ and employees’ records, including COVID-19 test results, for an unknown purpose. The employee is on administrative leave.
The county is outfitting its existing network of fire-spotting cameras with software to identify likely wildfire activity and alert authorities. Initially, however, the system must be “taught” to distinguish fire smoke from other forms of fog, vapor or clouds, via human feedback that should enable it to refine its algorithm.
The settlement agreement is a major setback for one of California’s signature pieces of gun control legislation. It comes 11 months after a federal judge said the state’s online ammunition background check program was so glitchy that tens of thousands of legal firearms owners were barred from buying ammunition — in violation of their 2nd Amendment rights.
Republican senators grilled Biden nominee Julie Su over California’s problems with its unemployment agency, as they consider her nomination for deputy secretary of Labor. But her confirmation was expected to be approved.
The technology typically draws a fierce backlash from drivers, who view the cameras as a cash cow for local jurisdictions that want to bust anyone who strays above the speed limit. And civil liberties groups often raise concerns about the cameras’ implications for privacy.
“Tech has not been in free fall,” economist Jerry Nickelsburg writes. “Indeed, its profitability has grown, and tech equities are the star performers.”
Only one of California’s 58 counties, Kern County, has signed contracts to participate in the Blue Shield agreement, marking another potential hiccup in a vaccination rollout that has frustrated many Californians.
California has consolidated Verily’s testing sites that remain with another vendor and is not renewing its two contracts when they expire this winter, according to the California Department of Public Health.
Yuba County systems were recently targeted by a cyberattack that forced IT staff to isolate affected computers to stop the malware. Officials say critical systems had backups and were successfully recovered.
EDD employees have told lawmakers the workload is overwhelming, leaving them working nights and weekends and feeling stressed to the breaking point. Some talked of not getting enough training and having to take breaks to cry after fielding calls and hearing desperate stories from Californians thrown out of work.
The funding -- almost $60 million for Sacramento County alone -- will support COVID-19-related efforts in testing, case investigation, contact tracing, surveillance, containment and mitigation from a grant through the California Department of Public Health.
“The roadblock to getting money to massive amounts of people who need it desperately is the same old problem — dinosaur technology,” said Assembly Member Jim Patterson, a Fresno Republican.
The San Diego County city of more than 100,000 recently debuted its “El Cajon 2.0” strategic plan, which should lean on technology; and its City Council indicated priorities, several of which involve tech and innovation. In a survey, a majority of residents supported the city adding cameras or sensors in public spaces if that information would only be used to enhance public safety.
The Marin Wildfire Prevention Authority will spend $108,000 initially and $72,000 annually to employ an app used during storms this week to evacuate 5,000 people in the Santa Cruz Mountains.
The funding worked out to $102 per resident for small counties and up to $197 per resident for counties with more than 500,000 residents, according to the report.
Unemployed workers have continued to complain of a glitchy website and an unresponsive call center. Those complaints have continued despite the EDD adding hundreds of workers and new technology designed to automate and streamline the claims process.
Months after district attorneys uncovered a prison fraud ring that conned the California Employment Development Department out of an estimated $2 billion or more, the head of an identity-security firm working for the state says global cybercriminals are bombarding EDD with fraudulent unemployment claims at a stunning clip.
